New Amazon Kindles and Cheaper Prices

Posted By
Tim
On
September 11, 2012 @ 4:30 PM
In
eReaders |
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Amazon recently announced a few new Kindle devices, along with a refresh of an existing Kindle model. Amazon’s Kindle has been well reviewed thanks to its vast selection of books available in Kindle format, free owners library for Amazon Prime members and aggressive pricing.

So what’s new?

The big news is the Kindle Fire HD 8.9″ and Kindle Fire HD 7″ tablets. The Kindle Fire line of tablets run a proprietary, heavily skinned version of Android with Amazon’s music, video, magazine and books built in. This model also features Amazon’s App Store, which like Apple’s, has an approval process to gain admission to, resulting in generally higher quality and less dangerous applications. The Fire line also features a built in web browser for visiting your favorite internet sites.

The Kindle Fire HD 7″ is a refresh of last year’s Kindle Fire, featuring improved 1.2ghz dual core processor, smoother more refined body design, front facing HD camera, dual driver speakers and faster WIFI performance thanks to the MIMO antenna. The Kindle Fire HD 7″ is available for $199 with 16GB of memory or $249 with 32GB of memory.

Last year’s Kindle Fire took a price drop to $159, making it a really fantastic deal for someone looking for an inexpensive tablet featuring Amazon’s proprietary build of Android. While not featuring a snazzy new dual core processor or faster WIFI, it may be the highest quality device at $159.

For people looking for a traditional eInk display eReader, the new Amazon Kindle Paperwhite offers a high resolution touch screen display, 25% more contrast and a new lighting system which allows the screen to reflect light in much the same way a lamp would light up a piece of paper. These features combine to offer a device with nearly 8 weeks of battery life (even when using the light) and the ability to hold 1100 books at a time. For those of us who loved the idea of a non-reflective eInk display for reading in sunlight/outside, but hated that you needed a separate light to read at night or in the dark, this may be the eReader of our dreams. Available for $119 with WIFI and $179 with free 3g service.

Last, but not least, the base model Kindle has its price dropped to $69 and will offer 15% faster page turns then previous models. At this price point, combined with the cheaper price of eBooks, it makes it a very attractive gift for someone who likes to read and doesn’t already own an eReader.

Check out Amazon’s Website[1] for more information and ship dates on the various Kindle devices.